Garden and Grief.
The garden and grief refers to the time that Jesus spent in the Garden of Gethsemane. This occurred after the Last Supper. Brian explains.
Grief in the Garden of Gethsemane
I would like to read about Jesus’ prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane in Mark 14:32-36, in the English Standard Version.
“And they went to a place called Gethsemane. And he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I pray.’ And he took with him Peter and James and John and began to be greatly distressed and troubled. And he said to them, ‘My soul is very sorrowful, even to death. Remain here and watch.’ And going a little farther, he fell on the ground and prayed that, if it were possible, the hour might pass from him. And he said, ‘Abba, Father, all things are possible for you. Remove this cup from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.’”
Mark 14:32-36
The Hour and the Cup
Jesus refers to the Cross as the “hour” and the “cup”. The word “hour” seems to include everything involved in the cross. The “cup” seems to focus in on God’s judgment on the cross. The name Gethsemane means “oil press” and here, the soul of Jesus feels the pressure, the weight, of the burden he will bear at Calvary. He does not whisper his prayer.
Hebrews 5:7 tells us,
“In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears.”
Hebrews 5:7
What fills the cup that Jesus is to drink? Curse. Death. Wrath. Sin.
Curse, Death, Wrath and Sin
Curse.
“Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.’”
(Galatians 3:13)
The one who should be worshipped became something to be cursed.
Death. Jesus, who is the ever-living God, would die in his human flesh.
“Fear not, I am the first and the last, and the living one. I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.”
(Revelation 1:17-18)
Curse and Death. The hymn writer describes them:
“Death and the curse were in our cup, O Christ, ’twas full for Thee!
But Thou hast drained the last dark drop — ’Tis empty now for me.”
Wrath. This is how the hymn describes the wrath of God that fell on Jesus at Calvary:
“Jehovah bade His sword awake, O Christ, it woke ’gainst Thee!
Thy blood the flaming blade must slake; Thy heart its sheath must be.”
Death. Curse. Wrath. Sin.
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
2 Cor 5:21
Complete Perfection
Some people look at Jesus’ agony in the garden and think they see in Jesus’ sweat and sorrow imperfection as a human being. It is just the opposite: Jesus’ pain is caused by his complete perfection as God and man. His perfect, sinless human life and his eternal sinless life as God. Why was it so painful? We just read it: “For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin.”
The Cup in the Lord’s Supper
We can contrast this cup with another cup – the cup which Jesus used in the Lord’s Supper. That cup has been called, “The Holy Grail” and has caused legendary quests to find it. In modern times, pursuing that holy chalice has been made glitzy in the Hollywood movie, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Finding that cup from the last supper has been pictured as an adventure, heroic, noble, glorious.
The Cup and Garden and Grief
There have been no such attempts to experience the cup Jesus prayed about in Gethsemane. The men who boasted they could drink that cup – James and John – scatter like sheep when Jesus drinks that cup at Calvary. They have no desire to drink Death. No thirst for a cup Cursed. No appetite to swallow God’s Wrath. No boldness to fully face their own sin, let alone the sin of the world. Only Jesus could do that.
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
II Corinthians 5:21
Have you put your faith in Jesus so that you can be righteous in him?
How has this post about the Garden and Grief affected you? Contact us at HopeStreamRadio, or comment below.
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